November 18, 1994:
58 to 69 mph wind gusts result in isolated damage to structures across
south central and southeastern Minnesota. Some of the counties included
were Blue Earth, Faribault, Freeborn, Goodhue, Le Sueur, Nicollet, Rice,
Steele, and Waseca.November 18, 1979: A heat wave continues in Southwest Minnesota. The temperature hits 70 degrees at Browns Valley.

Slushy Possibilities - Blizzard Potential West of MSP

Maybe if I put the parka on over my shorts I'll be OK? Wednesday's
60-degree warmth seems like a meteorological mirage. Blame a low sun
angle. The northern hemisphere has caught a cold - the first real sneeze
of Canadian air spinning up an intense storm today.

A tight
pressure gradient causes air to accelerate into a partial vacuum (the
center of low pressure) at speeds as high as 50-55 mph over western
Minnesota, creating white-out conditions. I'd think twice about driving
toward the Dakotas, unless you're a fan of white-knuckle driving.

The
axis of heaviest snow, 8-12 inches or more, runs from Windom to Wadena
to Walker - into the Minnesota Arrowhead. ECMWF guidance prints out 5-10"
inches or so for St. Cloud, Brainerd and Duluth; maybe a sloppy inch or
two for the Twin Cities, where snow will melt on contact until late
afternoon today. Consider this payback for the warmest start to November
on record, statewide.
Skies clear over the weekend with a little rain next Tuesday, but dry weather on Thanksgiving with highs in the low 40s.

That's "average" for late November, remember?

Blizzard Warning.
The National Weather Service has expanded the area under a Blizzard
Warning to Willmar and St. Cloud. An hour or two west of the Twin Cities
and travel conditions will range from treacherous to impassable.
Details:

A BLIZZARD WARNING IS IN EFFECT FRIDAY FOR MUCH OF WEST CENTRAL MINNESOTA...MAINLY WEST OF REDWOOD FALLS TO WILLMAR AND ALEXANDRIA. THIS AREA WILL SEE THE DEVELOPMENT OF BLIZZARD CONDITIONS FRIDAY MORNING AS NORTHWEST WINDS OF 30 TO 40 MPH WITH GUSTS T0 50 MPH COMBINE WITH HEAVY SNOW. THIS WILL CAUSE CONSIDERABLE BLOWING SNOW AND WHITEOUT CONDITIONS WITH TRAVEL
BECOMING VERY DIFFICULT OR IMPOSSIBLE ACROSS WEST CENTRAL MINNESOTA.
TO THE EAST OF THE BLIZZARD AREA...WINTER STORM WARNINGS AND ADVISORIES ARE IN EFFECT WHERE WINDS ARE NOT EXPECTED TO BE QUITE AS STRONG AND SNOW AMOUNTS WILL BE LESSER. THE WINTER STORM WARNING INCLUDES AREAS NEAR ST CLOUD...LITTLE FALLS...AND LONG PRAIRIE. THE WINTER WEATHER ADVISORY IS IN EFFECT FOR MUCH OF
SOUTH CENTRAL AND EAST CENTRAL MINNESOTA...INCLUDING THE MAJORITY OF THE TWIN CITIES METRO AREA AND MANKATO.
RAIN WILL CHANGE TO SNOW ACROSS WESTERN MINNESOTA BY EARLY FRIDAY MORNING AND BECOME HEAVY AT TIMES INTO EARLY AFTERNOON BEFORE TAPERING OFF BY EVENING. ACROSS CENTRAL AND EASTERN MINNESOTA RAIN WILL CHANGE TO SNOW FRIDAY AFTERNOON. SNOW ACCUMULATIONS OF 6 TO 12 INCHES ARE EXPECTED WEST OF A LINE FROM REDWOOD FALLS TO ST CLOUD AND LAKE MILLE LACS WITH THE HEAVIEST AMOUNTS OVER DOUGLAS...TODD...AND MORRISON CONTINUES. AMOUNTS WILL TAPER OFF
QUICKLY TO THE EAST...WITH AROUND ONE INCH EXPECTED IN EASTERN PARTS OF THE ADVISORY AREA INCLUDING THE TWIN CITIES METRO.

Future Radar.
4km NAM (WRF) guidance from NOAA shows a band of heavy, wind-whipped
snow setting up over western and central Minnesota this morning, but
rain may not change over to snow in the Twin Cities until later this
afternoon, with a fair amount of melting on contact, which will help to
keep amounts down in the immediate metro, where snow totals should
range from a coating to an inch or two. Source: NOAA and AerisWeather.

Big Snow Maker for Central Minnesota?
Latest models push the axis of heaviest snow a bit farther east; NAM
guidance hinting at a foot for the Brainerd Lakes - maybe a half foot or
more for St. Cloud. Source: WeatherBell.

ECMWF Snowfall Prediction.
Although not quite as impressive as the 4km NAM the European model
prints o ut 10-12" from near Windom to Alexandria to Wadena and Walker
into much of the Minnesota Arrowhead.

BPI: Blizzard Potential Index.
Our internal models show a high probability of blizzard conditions (35
mph sustained winds with visibility under 1/4 mile) from near Sioux
Falls to Granite Falls and Alexandria this morning. Source:
AerisWeather.

Winter's First Smack.
And to think it was 61F in the Twin Cities on Wednesday. By Saturday
morning wind chills dip into single digits over far western Minnesota
(with fresh snow on the ground). 16F at Minneapolis St. Paul should get
your attention. Source: AerisWeather AMP.

How To Survive a Winter Storm. Meteorologist Susie Martin at AerisWeather has a review and some good advice as we sail into primetime for wintry precipitation: "...Winter
storms can bring a variety of precipitation. For example, a storm may
begin to produce rain, but as cold air arrives, that precipitation can
change over into freezing rain or snow. It all depends on the depth of
the layer of warm air (above 32°F) present. As shown in the chart above,
clouds may begin precipitating snow, but as the snow encounters the
warmer layer of air, it melts. The degree of melting can mean the
difference between snow, ice or sleet.
The deeper the layer of warm air, the more liquid the precipitation
will become. Freezing rain is, personally, my least favorite. This
requires a rather deep layer of warm air above the ground and freezing
or subfreezing conditions at the surface. In this scenario, the
precipitation freezes on contact with the ground. This can be very
dangerous as it’s easy to think it’s simply raining outside, but then
you step outside to slip and fall on the slick sidewalk as a thin layer
of ice has formed..."Thanksgiving Day: GFS.
NOAA's GFS model is predicting a cold rain for much of New England next
Thursday with snow showers for upstate New York and the mountains of
northwest Colorado. The next Pacific storm pushes rain into the Portland
and Seattle; otherwise the rest of America looks dry and relatively
mild for late November. Source: WSI.Thanksgiving Day: ECMWF.
The European model suggests light showers of rain and wet snow for New
England; heavier rain over the eastern Carolinas and Mid Atlantic as
well as the Pacific Northwest. Dry weather prevails across most of
America with unusually mild weather from the Plains into the
southwestern USA. Source: WSI.

Record Warmth in November - But Big Changes Coming?
Jason Samenow tracks the bubble of unusual warmth over North America,
and a potential shift in the pattern brewing for December. We're due.
Here's an excerpt at Capital Weather Gang: "...Beyond
Thanksgiving into early December, some forecasters are intrigued by the
GFS model, which is advertising a radical change in the weather pattern
over North America. It suggests a major destabilization of the polar
vortex and for the North Atlantic Oscillation to plunge into the
negative territory. When this oscillation is strongly negative, it
promotes the flow of Arctic air into the eastern United States, and the
pattern is often favorable for snowstorms. “Time to gas up the snow
blower across the U.S.,” tweeted Judah Cohen,
a seasonal forecaster for Atmospheric and Environmental Research. “IF
(big if) pattern verifies, that is as favorable a pattern for snowstorms
that I can recall...”

NOAA: U.S. Snowcover Hits an "All-Time Low" for November. Here's the intro to an explainer at Engadget: "Researchers just supplied more evidence that climate change-related temperature increases are having a material effect on the planet. America's National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration reports
that snow cover in the lower 48 states is the lowest ever recorded for
mid-November. As you can see in the map below, there's very little snow
on the ground in the country -- you'd likely have to climb a mountain to
see it. For contrast, the average snow cover between 1981 and 2010
reached as far south as New Mexico..."

Second Warmest October Cements Hottest Year.Climate Central has an update: "...But
even La Nina years now are warmer than El Niño years several decades
ago because of the long-term warming caused by carbon dioxide and other
heat-trapping gases emitted into the atmosphere. Because of the
combination of El Niño and manmade warming, 2016 will best 2015 as the
hottest year on record, the third record-warm year in a row, the World Meteorological Organization told delegates at the U.N. climate meeting in Morocco..."

43 Large Fires Burning Across USA. Check out the latest statistics from the U.S. Wildfire Tracker, courtesy of WXshift.

A Heartbreaking Hurricane. Hurricane Katrina is linked to heart attacks many years after the storm, according to an analysis at Nexus Media: "...Irimpen
and his colleagues also found that patients were significantly more
likely to have other risk factors for heart attack post-Katrina than
before the hurricane, including coronary artery disease, diabetes, high
blood pressure and high cholesterol. They were also more likely to be
smokers. The researchers found that these patients were more than twice
as likely to abuse drugs, or suffer from a psychiatric disease as their
pre-Katrina counterparts. Moreover, unemployment and lack of health
insurance were significantly more frequent among the post-Katrina
patients, he says. Post-Katrina patients also were more likely to
receive prescriptions for medications to treat heart disease,
cholesterol and hypertension, but were only half as likely to take them
compared to the pre-Katrina group, he says..." (Image credit: "New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina". Source: United States Navy).

King Tide Flooding a Preview of the Daily Norm We Can Expect. The Boston Globe reports: "Did
the king tides give us a glimpse into the future? The flooding caused
recently by the tides in coastal communities around the world, including here in Massachusetts,
may be far more normal in just a few decades, thanks to climate change.
Experts warn that eventually sea levels will have risen to the point
where such flooding will be routine. “King tides preview how sea level
rise will affect coastal places,” the Environmental Protection Agency says.
“As time goes by, the water level reached now during a king tide will
be the water level reached at high tide on an average day..."

Photo credit: Lane Turner/Globe staff. "Lynda DeBiccari waded in the rising waters during the king tides Tuesday at the Long Wharf in Boston."

Intensified by Climate Change, "King Tides" Change Ways of Life in Florida. The New York Times
provides more perspective on the increasingly "routine" tidal flooding,
and how rising seas are making that flooding more problematic: "...Monday’s planetary dance was particularly notable: The moon
was both full and at its closest distance to the Earth since 1948. The
closer the moon, the stronger the gravitational tug on the oceans, the
higher the tide. Rising sea levels exacerbate the flooding, scientists
said. In much of South Florida, including Broward County and Fort
Lauderdale, finding short- and long-term fixes to the challenges of
flooding caused by rising seas is a priority. A new position now exists
to deal with it: resiliency chief or sustainability director. Pumps and
backflow valves have been put in place. Roads will be or have been
elevated (most famously in Miami Beach, which invested $400 million to
deal with flooding). Sea walls are being raised. Counties are also
beginning to rethink building codes. Taken together, the costs will be
enormous..."

Photo credit: "Monday’s supermoon, with its strong gravitational pull, created high tides that flooded some South Florida coastal towns." Publish Date November 17, 2016. Photo by Scott McIntyre for The New York Times.

Six Reasons Why NOAA's GOES-R Satellite Matters. Phys.org
has a story with context and perspective, why the launch of GOES-R
(soon to be GOES-16) is a very big deal for weather forecasting: "...The
primary instrument on the new GOES-R satellite will collect three times
more data and provide four times better resolution and more than five
times faster coverage than current satellites. This means the satellite
can scan Earth's Western Hemisphere every five minutes and as often as
every 30 seconds in areas where severe weather forms, as compared to
approximately every 30 minutes with the current GOES satellites..."

Image credit:
"Major Hurricane Joaquin is shown at the far eastern periphery of the
GOES West (GOES-15) satellite's full disk extent, taken at 1200z on
October 1, 2015." Credit: NOAA.Weather Satellite Revolution.
Here's more detail from NOAA: "Included in the advanced equipment on
the satellite is the new Geostationary Lightning Mapper. In addition to
providing forecaster with information on the potential for severe storm
development this new technology will allow NOAA to provide real-time
observations of lightning data directly to the public. This will allow
the public to track lightning activity throughout the country, monitor
nearby storms, and curtail outdoor activities early to avoid the
lightning threat.

This year there have been 36 lightning deaths in
the U.S., the most since 2007 when there were 45 fatalities. On average
there have been about 30 lightning deaths in the U.S. in recent years.

More information on the Geostationary Lightning Mapper can be found at:

The Extraordinary Effects of Dust on Global Weather. Pacific Standard has a fascinating story - here's an excerpt: "...So
what effect will all that extra dust have on Earth’s weather and
climate in the future? No one really knows — at least not yet. “One of
the greatest sources of uncertainty in global climate models is
aerosol-cloud interactions,” says Charlotte Beall, a researcher and
graduate student at Scripps. “And that uncertainty impedes our progress
with these models, which are our predictive, diagnostic tool for
understanding what is going to happen in a changing climate...” (Photo: NOAA AOML).

How Wind and Solar Plan To Thrive During the Trump Presidency. Here's an excerpt from a story at Utility Dive: "...Our industry will be fine,” Sunnova CEO John Berger told Utility Dive. Sunnova is one of the leading national rooftop solar providers. “Business models will change and the companies that can’t deliver a better service at a better price won’t make it.”
Losing its 30% federal investment tax credit (ITC) might even provoke
constructive change, Berger said. “But with or without the ITC, this industry
will thrive and that is because we are quickly driving down the cost of
solar and solar components and now the cost of batteries is coming down
as fast...” Image credit: NAHB livestreamProtecting Your Digital Life in 7 Easy Steps. The New York Times has some good advice: "There are more reasons than ever to understand how to protect your personal information. Major hacks seem ever more frequent. Investigators believe that a set of top-secret National Security Agency hacking tools were offered to online bidders
this summer. And many of those worried about expanded government
surveillance by the N.S.A. and other agencies have taken steps to secure
their communication..."

Image credit: Kacper Pempel/Reuters.

These 6 New Technology Rules Will Govern Our Future. Here's a clip from a story at The Washington Post that got my full attention: "...In
every field, machines and robots are beginning to do the work of
humans. We saw this first happen in the Industrial Revolution, when
manual production moved into factories and many millions lost their
livelihoods. New jobs were created, but it was a terrifying time, and
there was a significant societal dislocation (from which the Luddite
movement emerged). The movement to digitize jobs
is well underway in low-salary service industries. Amazon relies on
robots to do a significant chunk of its warehouse work. Safeway and Home
Depot are rapidly increasing their use of self-service checkouts. Soon,
self-driving cars will eliminate millions of driving jobs. We are also
seeing law jobs disappear as computer programs specializing in discovery
eliminate the needs for legions of associates to sift through paper and
digital documents..."

Watch What Camp Life Is Like for Children Who Are Allergic To The Sun. Atlas Obscura has the story: "Summer
camp is a great American tradition. And one completely out of reach for
the so-called “children of the night”—the name given to kids who are
allergic to the sun. This rare condition, xeroderma pigmentosum,
makes summer camp, or any daytime outdoors activity, painful and even
fatally dangerous. Luckily, there is a place that seeks to reclaim the
tradition for children afflicted with XP: Camp Sundown. Opened
in 1995, the camp is celebrating its 21st anniversary this year, as it
continues to grow in attendance and in its efforts to bring attention to
the condition..."

TODAY: Blizzard Warning west of St. Cloud. High winds with snow, as much as 5-10" by evening with severe drifting. Travel ranges from treacherous to impassable.
Winds: NW 20-40. High: 40, falling to 30 by late afternoon.

Trump Win Opens Way for China To Take Climate Leadership Role. Reuters reports: "The
election of climate change skeptic Donald Trump as president is likely
to end the U.S. leadership role in the international fight against
global warming and may lead to the emergence of a new and unlikely
champion: China. China
worked closely with the administration of outgoing President Barack
Obama to build momentum ahead of the 2015 Paris Agreement on climate
change. The partnership of the two biggest greenhouse gas emitters
helped get nearly 200 countries to support the pact at the historic meet
in France's capital..."

Photo credit: "U.S. President-elect Donald Trump gestures as he speaks at election night rally in Manhattan, New York, U.S., November 9, 2016." REUTERS/Mike Segar.Climate Change, Hurricanes and Floods: An LSU Dialogue. Louisiana will be one of the first states to be impacted by rising seas and heavier summer rains; here's an excerpt from NOLA.com: "Climate change, hurricanes and floods
were hot topics Wednesday (Nov. 16) during the Louisiana State
University International Programs' intercultural dialogue on weather,
water and climate. Whatever the extent of climate change, one speaker
said, Louisiana will be in the crosshairs. Jay Grymes, chief
meteorologist at WAFB television, opened the presentations with a focus
on the state's wet climate and the potential effects of climate change.
He warned that of the lower 48 states, Louisiana might be the most
severely affected..."

Photo credit: Max Becherer, AP.Tracking Effects of Climate Change on Human Health. Here's an excerpt from Huffington Post: "...It
is vital that progress on limiting emissions of carbon dioxide and
short-lived climate pollutants, such as methane and black carbon, is
monitored. Governments must be held accountable for meeting their
nationally determined contributions
towards global cuts in emissions, and incentivised to go further.
Climate change poses major threats to human health but policies to
reduce emissions have great potential to improve health in the
near-term, including by reducing air pollution and encouraging dietary
changes. A new international initiative aims to provide more crucial
information on the relationship between climate change and health..."

Sticking To Lower 1.5C Warming Limit Would Protect World Economy. Here's a clip from Reuters: "Limiting
global temperature rise to 1.5 degrees Celsius, a goal of the Paris
Agreement on climate change, would avoid economic losses by 2050 of $12
trillion, or around 10 percent of the world's GDP, compared to staying
on the current track of at least 3 degrees of warming, the U.N.
Development Programme said on Wednesday. Sticking
to the 1.5 degree limit is feasible, it said in a report for the
Climate Vulnerable Forum, a group of more than 40 countries most at risk
from climate change..." (Image credit: NASA).

WMO: Past 5 Years Hottest on Record, Worldwide. Here's an excerpt from a story at Fusion: "...On
November 8, the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) delivered a
report at the international conference on climate change in Morocco
(COP22) which was called in order to carry forward the Paris agreement
of COP21. The WMO reported that the past five years were the hottest on record.
It reported rising sea levels, soon to increase as a result of the
unexpectedly rapid melting of polar ice, most ominously the huge
Antarctic glaciers. Already, Arctic sea ice over the past five years is
28% below the average of the previous 29 years, not only raising sea
levels, but also reducing the cooling effect of polar ice reflection of
solar rays, thereby accelerating the grim effects of global warming..." (Image: NASA).

Military Leaders Urge Trump To See Climate As a Security Threat.Scientific American has the story; here's an excerpt: "...The
Center for Climate & Security in its briefing book argues that
climate change presents a risk to U.S. national security and
international security, and that the United States should advance a
comprehensive policy for addressing the risk. The recommendations,
released earlier this year, were developed by the Climate and Security
Advisory Group, a voluntary, nonpartisan group of 43 U.S.-based senior
military, national security, homeland security and intelligence experts,
including the former commanders of the U.S. Pacific and Central
commands. The briefing book argues that climate change presents a
significant and direct risk to U.S. military readiness, operations and
strategy, and military leaders say it should transcend politics. It goes
beyond protecting military bases from sea-level rise, the military
advisers say. They urge Trump to order the Pentagon to game out
catastrophic climate scenarios, track trends in climate impacts and
collaborate with civilian communities..." (File photo: AP).DC Prepares For Heat Emergencies To Nearly Double by 2020, Among Other Climate Change Effects. Here's a clip from DCist: "...D.C.
currently experiences around 11 heat emergency days per year, which
could almost double to 20 days by 2020 and spike up to 75 days by 2080,
according to the report. Washingtonians should also expect much warmer
average temperatures; longer, hotter, and more frequent heat waves; and
more frequent and intense heavy rain and flooding. The city has already begun to see record-breaking heat waves
and snowstorms as well as flooding caused by rising sea levels and high
rainfall. Climate Ready DC, the city's readiness plan, looks at current
weather patterns and predicts how they will change by 2080. The report,
which was developed by consulting with experts inside and outside of
District government, then outlines the city's strategies to adapt..." Photo credit: SweetJen34

The End of Ice. Check out the photo essay at New Republic: "...The peculiar physics of climate change have played a particularly nasty trick on those who live farthest to
the north. The steady, relentless stream of data from satellites,
weather buoys, and remote weather stations makes it clear that the
Arctic—which has supported human life for millennia—is warming twice as fast as any place on the planet. But you don’t need data to understand what’s happening: Pictures will do..."